Levi Pearson, and other parents whose children attended Scotts Branch High School, wanted the county to provide buses for their children. Mr. Pearson was encouraged by Rev. Joseph Armstrong DeLaine, Sr. to file a suit against the county's bus policy. Pearson agreed to be a plaintiff and in 1947 he filed a suit against Clarendon County School District 26. Levi Pearson suffered for filing the suit. His credit was eliminated and whites refused to buy his timber. The white response to the Pearson family foreshadowed later acts of hostility and violence for blacks in Clarendon County.
